The VC wants change – the professoriate wants to help

Vice Chancellor Brigid Heywood wants to restructure just about all the university’s operations (CMM July 22, July 23, July 30) and the professoriate has ideas.

While its members think the plan “has much to commend it” the professoriate warns, “the proposed structure of the institution increases non-academic management influence, and reduces the academic voice in the management of our university.”

The professoriate has set out its concerns to the VC including;

* an “absence of clarity” on how teaching-only and research-active academics will be identified

* management proposals for “reshaping” teaching and learning which, “create unnecessary tumult”

* “broad generalisations about the deficiencies” of academics and “documentary and anecdotal evidence suggesting an ageist bias.”

“We need to critically consider the implementation and the implications of the steps that are to be taken, so that we get it right and are able to move quickly and coherently,” the professors state.